Charles G. Brown, National Counsel
Consumers for Dental Choice
1725 K St., N.W., Suite 511 , Washington, DC 20006
Ph. 202.822-6307; Fax 822-6309
charlie@toxicteeth.org
5 February 2007
Five years after adopting a law mandating mercury fillings fact sheets, New Hampshire has adopted one that fulfills the statute. Last month, upon instructions from the state attorney general, the state dental board revoked its sham “fact sheet” (a promotion sheet for mercury fillings) and replaced it with one to comply with the law.
Since 2002, the New Hampshire dental board had defied the law. In Nov. 2005 we did an end run -- I wrote a letter of complaint to the state Attorney General, Kelly Ayotte. In Feb. 2006, the Attorney General and two of her top staff met with a six-person delegation: our two lead New Hamp. advocates, Rosie Cronin (who spearheaded passage of the law) and Doug Bogen of Clean Water Action; the author of the law, former Representative Hal Lynde; physician-lawmaker Jim Pilliod; Michael Bender, head of the lead national group on mercury, the Mercury Policy Project; and yours truly. In the ensuring year -- involving lawsuit threats from us and wrangling by the Attorney General’s office -- the dental board was forced to face the music.
It’s puzzling to many folks why a law is passed, then defied by those in power; the New Hampshire scenario is a déjà vu of California. Organized dentistry has so much to hide that the pro-mercury dentists that run most dental boards pretend the First Amendment and state laws don’t apply to them … until called to task. Plainly, our vigilance -- petitioning public officials, going to the press, seeking remedy in the courts -- must continue until the mercury apologists realize this primitive 19 th century device must go.
Here are fact sheets currently in place:
As with our five-year battle in California, the NH fact sheet has compromise language, including some we disagree with, but it also includes warnings: it says mercury amalgam has “health and environmental concerns,” it recognizes the “controversy surrounding the potential environmental and health impacts of the mercury found in amalgam”; it acknowledges that “mercury vapor … from amalgam fillings can be absorbed into the body”; and it raises particular concern for “children from conception to the age of six.”